


Reconfiguring Variables

by lateralus112358



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-07
Updated: 2018-12-06
Packaged: 2019-06-23 05:50:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,915
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15599709
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lateralus112358/pseuds/lateralus112358
Summary: Analogue Interface Sameen Shaw stews in captivity.





	1. Relevance

**Author's Note:**

> This is just a fun/hopefully funny thing I wrote while taking a break from other things. Hope you enjoy it!

Root knocks on the door of the hotel room where Veronica Sinclair is supposed to be staying. She glances down at the gun tucked into the front of her pants. Does it come off as too aggressive? It’s supposed to be reassuring in a trust-me-I-can-handle-this kind of way. She’d put it there because tucking it into the back seemed a bit nefarious, like she was trying to hide it, but people were giving her weird looks on the way over anyway. Where do normal people put their guns when they’re out and about? Maybe she should just get some holsters like she had when she was with the ISA, then people would just think she was a cop. That could cause other problems, though. 

Veronica still hasn’t appeared. Root shifts her weight from one foot to another, glancing back down the hallway. Did the ISA already get to her? Or what about that other guy who randomly showed up? Was he from Research, or somewhere else entirely? Why is Root so popular all of a sudden, and why couldn’t it have happened back in high school? Being popular, not being nearly murdered and chased around New York, although both can be fun under the right circumstances.

A dark haired woman opens the door, fixing Root with an intense stare.

Root gives her most winning smile. “Veronica Sinclair?”

The woman continues her stare for a moment, jaw moving back and forth slightly. She seemed a lot more nervous on the phone. Eventually she seems to come to a decision and says, “Yes.”

A muted thumping sound reaches Root’s ears, emitting from within the apartment. It sounds like someone tied up in a bathtub. Which is rather specific, but tied-up-in-a-bathtub is a completely different sound from, say, tied-up-in-a-closet. A true professional recognizes the nuance. Root tries to look around Veronica, who then punches her in the face.

***

Root wakes up ziptied to a chair. Which, generally speaking, isn’t a situation she’d mind, especially at the hands of an already very attractive woman who has become incalculably sexier by virtue of knocking Root out and tying her up. But she is in kind of a hurry, given how the ISA seems so eager to murder her. She’ll have to figure out a way to interrogate this woman, and find a way to escape from her.

Possibly by seducing her. 

There are other options, but they’re less fun.

“I don’t want to be here. I’m sure you don’t either so let’s make this quick.” ‘Veronica’ pulls a chair up in front of Root and sits down, drawing a gun from inside her jacket. _That’s_ what Root needs. Tons of storage, and it would look amazing on her. 

“I don’t mind,” Root says with a shrug. “We can stay as long as you want.” The ISA is probably on their way here now. She’ll keep that bargaining chip tucked away until she needs it.

“What is Research?”

“No foreplay at all?” Root smirks, shifting in her chair a bit, then stopping at a pointed look from ‘Veronica.’ “It’s where we get our numbers. Threats to national security that we need to eliminate.”

“What else?”

“We don’t ask questions about Research, Veronica,” Root says with a mocking smile. “We just—“

She cuts off with gasp of pain as ‘Veronica’ grabs a finger on Root’s left hand and bends it sharply backwards. Holding it there, leaning forward and bringing her face inches from Root’s, she says in a low voice, “I’ve read your file. I know you found something out. I know the ISA is trying to kill you and I know they’re on their way here right now so quit wasting my time.” 

She releases Root’s finger and leans back, keeping her gun level. Root flexes the aching digit to ensure that it’s still functional. It’s one of her favorite fingers. “Just when I thought we were starting to make a connection,” she says sardonically, and gives a wistful sigh before continuing on. “We had a number a few years ago, a guy trying to sell government secrets to Hezbollah. Real Veronica there,” she nods her head towards the closed bathroom door. “Who I’m guessing isn’t in the tub just for a nice soak, told my partner the payments had been spoofed. I looked into it myself. They came from inside the ISA.”

“I asked about Research.”

“No need to rush,” Root says lightly. “Research is never wrong. They gave us bad information on purpose.”

‘Veronica’ leans back slightly. “You really don’t know what you’ve stepped in here. They’re covering something up. Something I need to find.”’ Veronica’s phone makes a small sound, and she reaches over to take it from the table it’s lying on, keeping her on eyes on Root except for a brief glance at the screen. “Time’s up,” she says, standing and returning her gun to her jacket. “We’ll have to finish this later.”

“Anytime, sweetie.”

‘Veronica’ spares her one last, baleful look before making for the door.

Which bursts open, two men with guns charging through. ‘Veronica’ is on the ground faster than Root would have thought possible, evidently having drawn her gun at the same time since four quick shots sound and the two begin to topple. Root can see two more outside the door. She doesn’t recognize them specifically, but she knows who they are. ISA. 

‘Veronica’ heaves herself up from the floor, colliding with one of the still-falling men, pushing him forward as a shield that his comrades empty bullets into. Her gun fires from under the corpse’s arm, dropping the other two in quick succession.

At this moment, in Root’s mind, all other women cease to exist.

‘Veronica’ leaves.

Root stands, shrugging away the zipties she’d cut with a small serrated knife she keeps inside her sleeve. Had ‘Veronica’ noticed? Root was sure she had. That she didn’t do anything about it implied either that she didn’t really want to hurt Root, or that she simply didn’t view Root as a viable threat. Neither does anything to diminish Root’s infatuation. Though if it’s the latter, she’ll make sure to prove otherwise the next time they meet. 

Moments later, the man from before, the one in the suit, comes into the room, gun in hand. ‘Veronica’ had kept Root’s own gun, she realizes suddenly. Probably as a keepsake. It’s a bit early in their relationship for that kind of sentimentality, but Root won’t give her a hard time about it.

Not too much, anyway.

“Are you all right?” The man asks, clearly not intending to shoot her. She supposes she could have taken a moment to talk to him last time instead of just unloading her weapon into him, but hey, second chances and all that. 

“I think so,” she replies. “We’re having a second date.”


	2. Razgovor

Root strolls along the sidewalk, across the street from the little Russian girl who’s today’s number. This job has been very enjoyable so far; who doesn’t like being a superhero? Harold and John are fun to mess with as well. Sameen Shaw, as the woman formerly known as Veronica Sinclair is named, has unfortunately been absent since she got access to The Machine, the very same Machine that Root had unknowingly been working for all that time at the ISA. It’s kind of like fate, Root thinks, and she knows Shaw will turn up sooner or later.

And in the meantime, she’s getting quite good at her new job. Her salary is absolutely ridiculous, though she’s thinking about demanding a raise anyway just on principle, and these jobs are actually a lot more exciting than most of the work she did with ISA. 

It’s a bit harder for her to enjoy herself when kids are involved. Reminds her too much of Hanna. This girl needs Root’s help, though, even if she doesn’t know it yet. Most people aren’t aware that they need her help until after she’s fixed all their problems for them, so she’s used to it.

The girl stops walking for a moment, looking in the window of a building. Oh, she must have seen Root’s reflection. Clever kid. Root waves. 

“Root, you know the idea of surveillance is to _avoid_ being seen, right?” John voice asks in her ear.

“Harold,” Root replies sweetly. “Could you please remind John which one of us worked for the ISA?”

The girl has started moving away more quickly, despite Root’s obvious friendliness. Baffling. Who wouldn’t want to hang out with her? Further down the street, men emerge from a dark car and try to grab Gen, and Root loses focus on narrating this story.

***

“You’re not really with immigration, are you?” Gen asks, as she and Root sit against the wall of a hallway in the bowels of the dilapidated building. John’s somewhere up above, trying to clear their escape route. The men after Gen seem to be Russian, but beyond that they’re in the dark, metaphorically as well as literally since there’s not a lot of light down here.

“Not exactly,” Root replies. “Not most days, anyway.”

Gen’s a pretty tough kid. Sure, she’s clearly scared, but not nearly as scared as most people would be after attempted kidnaps and seeing some of said kidnappers shot in front of her. She looks over at Root and asks, “So this is like, your job?” 

Root nods.

“That is so cool!” Gen says, leaning forward. “Who do you work for? CIA? NSA?”

“We’re more like… freelancers,” Root says. “Honestly, I’ve only been working here for a few months.”

“What did you do before?”

Root grins. “International espionage.”

Gen’s mouth drops open with awe. Collecting herself, she asks, “So why’d you quit?”

A shrug. “Spied on the wrong people.”

Gen looks down at her feet. “Maybe that’s what happened to me, too.”

“Who have you been spying on?”

“Pretty much everyone,” Gen says, standing up and grabbing Root’s arm. “Come on, I’ll show you.”

***

Gen’s information hub is quite impressive, and is also more than likely why she’s got a horde of Russians after her. They’re still roaming around the building, but Root and Gen should be able to stay hidden where they are, at least for a while. “This is very impressive, Gen,” Root says, looking up at the mass of wires running to various apartments in the complex.

Genrika glows at this compliment. “Can I see your gun?” she asks, somewhat hesitantly.

“Which one?” Root draws out one in each hand from her jacket.

“Whoa,” Gen says, taking one and hefting it. She turns it to either side, examining it. Clearly a familiar eye. If Root weren’t disinclined towards procreational activities she’d suspect this girl of being her daughter. “This is the safety, right?” Gen asks.

“Miss Groves,” Finch cuts in rather urgently on Root’s earpiece. “I’m not certain that allowing Miss Zhirova access to firearms is the best course of action.”

“My boss,” Root whispers, pointing to her ear and taking the weapon back. “He says we’re not allowed to have any fun.” The girl flinches at the sound of gunshots elsewhere in the building. John must have found them, or the other way around. Root pulls out her phone. She’s set up a small net to track the phones in the building. Not super useful since she doesn’t have time figure out how to filter out the normal residents, but at least it’ll let her know if anyone’s getting close. They seem safe for now, and Root closes the small radar.

“Who’s that?” Gen asks, seeing the picture gracing the lock screen of Root’s phone.

“My girlfriend,” Root replies. The picture is from about five years ago, but it’s the most recent one she could find, back when Shaw had been employed as a doctor. Afterwards, she’d apparently quit to become a contract killer. Pretty strange career path, all things considered.

“Does she work with you?”

“No,” Root sighs. “We’re having communication problems right now.”

It’s quiet for a moment. No more gunshots.

“So,” Gen asks quietly. “Why do… freelancers care about me?”

“That’s what we do, Gen,” Root says softly. “We help people in trouble. Besides,” she adds with a smile. “Us spy girls have got to stick together, right?”

Root’s phone alerts her at the same time she sees a thick gas filling the small space. 

“Come on,” she says, grabbing Gen and pulling her away from the rapidly spreading mist, drawing a gun. 

Shots are fired from in front of her. Root fires back, pulling Gen behind her. 

Gen screams, and Root whips around bringing her gun up. Something heavy impacts her face and everything goes dark.

***

“Miss Groves, I really would recommend that you let Mr. Reese and I handle it from here,” Finch is saying in her ear. “You need medical attention.”

But Root won’t relent. ‘We help people in trouble,’ she’d said to Gen, and that’s what she’s going to do. Someone has to. 

“I’m going after her, Harold,” Root spits. The bullets barely grazed her anyway. She’s not bleeding that much. “You can help me if you want, but you can’t stop me.”

Root remembers a friend who’d stood up for her. She remembers a girl who had been her only friend. She remembers Hanna, who never came home.

No one had been there to help Hanna. Not even Root. Root had failed her.

But she won’t fail Gen.

***

“I put my number in your phone,” Root says, glancing towards the expensive looking building that is Gen’s new school. “Just in case you need me.”

“OK,” Gen smiles. “I’m going to miss you, Root.”

“Well, you don’t have to be in trouble to call me,” Root says, pulling Gen into a tight hug. “So you don’t have to miss me at all.”

“Thank you,” Gen says, muffled, and then she pulls back. “I think I want to do what you do. When I grow up.”

Root smiles. “We’ll see.”

***

There’s a dark form waiting in Root’s apartment when she returns. It’s one she recognizes.

“We’re going on a trip,” Shaw says, raising a taser.

“No need for that,” Root tells her. “I’d go anywhere with you.”

Shaw tases her anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not much Root and Shaw interaction in this one, but putting Root and Gen together seemed too much fun to pass up. Hope you enjoyed it!


	3. Chapter 3

A sharp prod in her side drags Root out of her world of dreams, which had been populated by a distorted version of her middle school history teacher demanding to know why she’d left the ISA. Her claims that the agency had tried to kill her had failed to redeem her, much how she’d never been able to talk her way out of the assignments she’d copied from the school database. As she wakes up, the details begin to melt, leaving her with just the vague impression that she’s going to fail the class. 

Wait, no, that doesn’t make any sense. She’s on a mission for the ISA. Someone must have knocked her out. 

No, that doesn’t make sense either, they were trying to kill her. 

“Don’t rush yourself,” a low, sarcastic voice intones from beside her.

Oh, now Root remembers. She sits up and tries to brush her hair from her eyes and discovers that she can’t, since the appendages are currently ziptied to the steering wheel her head had been using as a pillow until a few moments ago. She shakes her hair away instead, and smiles at the woman beside her in the car. “If you were so impatient to talk to me, you shouldn’t have tased me and tied me up,” she shrugs lightly. “Not that I mind.”

“You’re deranged,” Shaw says flatly.

“You’re the one who wants to take a road trip with me, sweetie,” Root says, trying to stretch her sleep-tired limbs and experiencing mild success. “What does that say about you?”

“This wasn’t my idea,” Shaw says, and adds, “No, I’m not going to untie her.”

“Untie who?” Root inquires. “I thought it was just going to be me and you.”

“Not talking to you,” Shaw replies, looking annoyed. “No. I got her, now we’re doing it my way.”

“You know, Sameen,” Root offers helpfully. “Talking to yourself like that makes you sound like a crazy person.” Shaw casts her a withering look, and leans over across Root to put the keys in the ignition. “This could give a girl the wrong idea.”

“Shut up.” Shaw says, pulling away and neglecting to disconnect Root’s hands from the steering wheel.

“Were you talking to me that time?”

“Just drive.”

***

“So, are you going to tell me what we’re doing?” Root asks, strolling along the sidewalk beside Shaw, who had finally removed the zipties from Root’s wrists, apparently deeming the satisfaction not worth the public attention it would draw. “Not that I mind an afternoon out, but Harold and I haven’t discussed vacation time yet and I don’t really want to get fired unless it’s something important.”

“You think I would bring _you_ if I didn’t need to?” Shaw doesn’t look over as she walks.

“I think you could have gotten anyone for this,” Root says with a shrug. “But you came all the way to New York for lil’ ol’ me.”

Shaw stops, turns to Root and makes a motion with her face that’s a bit like an eye roll that she’s not invested enough to follow through on. Then she points at a statue just off the sidewalk. “In a few hours, you’re going to drive a truck into that.” Then she resumes walking.

***

“CIA safehouse,” Root observes, strolling around the sparsely decorated room as Shaw drags the now-unconscious agent back into the bathroom and begins ziptying his limbs together. There really is something special about a woman who’s always prepared. “I used to work for the CIA, you know,” she remarks. She’d done encryption and encryption-breaking for them before the ISA snatched her up.

“Yeah,” Shaw says, emerging from the bathroom and shutting the door. “I read your file.”

“Really?” Root asks. “What did you think?”

“I think that if you’re going to falsify your own government file you might want to make some of your edits a bit less blatant,” Shaw replies. “The CIA doesn’t hire 16 year olds.”

“They make exceptions,” Root says, sitting on the desk which serves as the only piece of furniture in the room. “Everything in my file is true. Well,” she adds with a shrug, “Except for the ‘best dressed’ award. I guess you didn’t find that one hard to believe, though.”

Shaw stares at Root without responding. The phone on desk rings, and she picks it up, responding to whoever’s on the other end with terse answers that represent code words. “They’ll be here for the pickup soon,” she says, putting the phone back down.

“What are they picking up?”

Shaw removes yet another ziptie from a pocket somewhere. “You.”

Root holds out her arms. This is turning out to be pretty fun. Shaw doesn’t move to restrain her, though. She just stands there with a vaguely annoyed expression on her face. Root waves a hand in front of her face to see if she’s frozen and receives a glare in response.

“How well do you know CIA protocols?” Shaw asks.

“Pretty well,” Root replies. “Why?”

“Could you impersonate a CIA agent?”

“If you’ve read my file, then you know I can.” Root says with a smile. Hacking skills aside, the reason the ISA had taken an interest in her in the first place was her knack for modulating her mannerisms. “Am I not getting tied up?” She asks.

“No,” Shaw’s voice grinds out. “Apparently.” She takes the ziptie and begins to set it around her own wrists. “Operation is called Sundown. Target origin is Ottawa. The guy’s walkie is going to mess up and you’ll have to fix it.” Arms secured, she glances up at Root. “Got it?

“Whatever you need, sweetie.”

Shaw sends her another unwavering glare.

***

Root climbs out over the hood of the truck she’d just driven into a statue. Either she drove into a gunfight or her arrival caused one, since the surrounding area is crowded with people and guns. Shaw has already freed herself and another prisoner from the back of the truck; the door is hanging open when Root reaches the rear of the vehicle. 

“Good to see you back at work, Root.” John says, who apparently was just sitting around waiting for Root to show up. Which is sensible, nothing interesting happens until she arrives.

“You miss me, John?” Root teases. “Hope you’ve got this under control,” she gestures towards the battle. “I’ve got to go see a girl.”

With this, she hefts the gun she’d lifted from the truck driver, and sets off towards the sewer manhole they’d gone through earlier in the day.

She finds Shaw at the end of the tunnel, standing over two unconscious men. The prisoner she’d rescued has evidently already escaped.

“You can go now.” Shaw says, glancing up at Root.

“I just wanted to see you off,” Root replies. Offhandedly she asks, “There aren’t any security cameras down here, are there?”

“No,” Shaw says, frowning. “Why—“

Root fires her lifted gun. A gun made for subduing raucous prisoners. A tranquilizer gun. Shaw registers the dart now emerging from her body, but her eyes only reflect rage rather than a loss of awareness. Root fires the gun again in mild fear as Shaw begins to reach for her own gun. She continues moving for a moment, before both darts overpower her and she keels over.

“What’s a little kidnapping between friends, anyway?” Root murmurs to the hopefully mostly unconscious Shaw.


	4. The Perfect Mark

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I bet you thought I'd forgotten about this story, since I haven't updated it in a thousand years.

“I trust, Miss Shaw,” Finch says, standing in front of the locked gate that separates him from the Faraday Cage library, where the inscrutable former doctor/contract killer resides. “That you won’t attack me when I open this.” She had not been particularly gregarious when she had woken here several days ago. Nor at any moment afterwards.

Sitting in a chair near the rear of the room, Shaw glances over at him, eyes narrowed. “You think that gate would stop me if I wanted to attack you?”

“I suppose that’s as close to an assurance as I’m likely to get,” Finch opens the gate and enters the room, stopping momentarily when he notices the seat of another chair, the back apparently snapped off, laying forlornly on the floor. “What happened there?”

Shaw looks over again at him again for several moments, staying seated. Then she looks away. “…I tripped.”

“I see.” Finch sets a tray of food down on one of the long tables, maintaining a distance from Shaw. She hasn’t attempted to attack anyone other than Root so far, but he’s not trying to test his luck. “And I suppose those books suffered the same misfortune.”

“I’m not big on romances.” Shaw says, kicking away one of the shredded books at her feet. “Or fast food,” she adds, glancing at Finch’s offering. “Bring me a steak next time.”

“I apologize that our selection in entertainment and cousine aren’t to your taste.” This comment earns Finch a flat stare, although Shaw still doesn’t rise. “The Machine has chosen you to speak to.”

“Yeah.”

“I was curious why that might be.”

“It’s your machine,” Shaw says. “Why don’t you just ask it?”

“Unfortunately, the Machine tends to be rather reticent. All anyone ever receives from it are strings of numbers. Except, that is, for you.”

“Lucky you,” Shaw says. “I’d rather get numbers. You planning on keeping me locked up for long?”

“As I recall, you did capture and threaten me at gunpoint, Miss Shaw,” Finch says, sounding mildly affronted. “Under the circumstances I feel our wariness is warranted.”

“That wasn’t personal.” 

“And you did much the same to Miss Groves, I believe,” Finch continues.

“I’m pretty sure she got off on it so I doubt she’s complaining. Now,” Shaw begins to rise. “I’m done talking.”

Finch retreats behind the gate and locks it. “I’ll see about getting you some different books.”

***

“I thought about being a therapist once,” Root remarks, handing the binoculars back over to Reese, standing beside her on the rooftop, to view their newest number. Some sort of con artist, it seems. The shamelessness of his scams is rather impressive. If also likely to get him killed.

“What happened?” Reese peers through the binoculars into the window of a high building opposite them.

“I thought about something else. How’s our friend doing, Harold?” 

“ _Still ornery,_ ” Finch says over the speaker. “ _Though less inclined to violence. At least against people. Unfortunately, I can’t say the same for my library._ ”

“What are we going to do with her, Finch?” Reese asks. “Can’t sleep with one eye open forever.”

“ _I’m unsure, Mister Reese. She still claims to be acting under the direction of the Machine._ ”

“You don’t believe her?” Root queries. “She seems pretty straightforward to me.” 

“ _I do believe her, which, quite frankly, is even more worrying. The Machine is not necessarily infallible, and certainly the employ of Miss Shaw does not engender confidence in its judgment._ ”

Root shrugs. “I like her.”

“Another argument against her,” Reese says, hints of a smile at the edge of an otherwise stoic face. Root rolls her eyes.

***

“You can’t keep me here forever.” This time Shaw’s sitting close to the gate, watching Finch as he approaches. The gate itself appears slightly more bent than he remembers it being in the past.

“I don’t intend to,” Finch says, keeping more than an arm’s length from the bars separating him from the library. “But until we’ve devised a better solution—“

“Let’s get one thing clear,” Shaw stands, stepping closer, clenching the bars of the gate in each hands. “When I want to leave, I’ll leave.”

“So if you are only here at your own pleasure,” Finch asks. “What is it that you really want, Miss Shaw? What are you trying to achieve?” 

“Not your business.” Shaw replies shortly.

“Why is it that you trust the Machine?

“I don’t trust anyone.”

“Yet you seem content to do as it instructs you.”

“We have a deal. That’s it.”

“What kind of…. deal could you possible have?”

“Don’t forget my steak.” Shaw steps back into the recesses of the library. “And tell the annoying one if she comes back again I’m going to strangle her.”


	5. Endgame

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Analogue Interface Sameen Shaw takes advantage of chaos.

Root slides into the booth beside Detective Carter, laying a rather large and heavy purse into the space between them. The contents make a metallic clank.

“Thanks for not telling the guys,” Carter says. She apparently means to pursue her vendetta against HR herself. As a woman with a healthy respect for a good vendetta, Root sympathizes, and made sure to give Detective Carter all of the best supplies John’s arsenal contained. 

“A girl needs her secrets,” Root replies. “Lionel never answers my calls anymore, anyway. I think he’s scared of me.” She leans back against the seat of the booth. “And the other two have enough to worry about right now.” Between the dozens of numbers the Machine has been spitting out and the gorgeous sociopath locked in the library, there’s no shortage of deadly crises to demand one’s attention. 

Speaking of which, both of those things need attention from Root as soon as possible. She wishes Carter good luck, and makes her way out of the building.

***

“What are we watching?” Root walks up to John and Harold, who are currently engrossed in something on Harold’s computer monitor. They both turn to her, and give her that familiar look they always use when they suspect her of doing something of questionable moral merit. It is almost always unjustified. She puts on her best innocent face, which is her normal face, for obvious reasons.

“Miss Groves,” Harold asks hesitantly. “When was the last time you spoke with Detective Carter?”

Root has now gotten close enough to see the security camera video playing on the monitor, showing a figure wielding a borrowed grenade launcher against a truck. “Harold,” she says placatingly. “If she’d wanted it to be a party, she would have invited you.”

“She can’t take on HR alone,” John says, stepping away from the Harold’s computer hub and further into the bowels of her team’s base.

“And you can?” She calls after him.

“No,” John replies. “We can.”

“I suppose,” Harold says. “We might as well add Detective Carter to our list of people to keep an eye on. Goodness knows we don’t have enough already.” He takes an exasperated glance at the dozens of pictures pinned to the board they use to keep track of recently received numbers.

“Is that why you let Sameen out?” Root asks idly. “More feet on the ground?”

Both Harold and John stop what they’re doing and turn to her with nearly identical expressions.

“Guess you didn’t know about that,” Root deducts. She’d noticed the gate open as she came in. Jailbreak is much sexier than parole, anyway. 

“I suspect,” Harold says after a moment. “That if Miss Shaw meant us harm, she could have done so already. Although I don’t relish spending the rest of my life sleeping with one eye open, I think we may have to let her go until we get a handle on HR and Detective Carter.”

“She’ll probably come for me first, anyway,” Root offers. “By the way, John,” she adds as she watches him root around in corners of the room. “We should stop by my place on the way. Jocelyn has most of your gear.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I haven't forgotten about this story, I'm just a lazy motherfucker. The next chapter should appear soon since this one was quite short, and maybe then I'll actually work on my cyberpunk and gothic stories so I can post them before I'm the only one still here to read them.

**Author's Note:**

> Profuse thanks as always to all readers, commenters, and kudoers.


End file.
